Sunday, December 26, 2010

This has been a very busy week of crafting for us. Lip gloss, candles, and salt dough ornaments all in one week. Wheeeewww!! One of our activities for Christmas Eve was to paint our salt dough ornaments.

Even John, Mr. anti-art, chipped in and painted his one ornament.

The girls also got in a little time outside in the snow. They decided to turn the slide into a sledding hill.

Here is Lori watching our neighbor girl demonstrate.

Then after a night of going to a Christmas Eve service and looking at lights, the girls came home and opened their new jammies.

Thursday, December 23, 2010

I found these fabulously easy instructions on making homemade candles in the book I Can Make a Rainbow, and I have been itching to make some. So the girls and I decided we would make them as Christmas gifts this year for the Grandparents and miscellaneous friends. We made Layered Candles and Sand Candles.

Here is what you will need to get started:

Paraffin Wax ( I bought a 5 lb. block at Hobby Lobby)

Crayons

Tin Can

Cheese Grater

Wicks

Fragrance

Containers to put your wax in (We used Dixie cups but you could also use yogurt cups or small milk cartons)

Sand

Box

For the Layered Candles

Step 1: Chop up your wax into small pieces and place in the can. You only need to fill it up 1/4 of the way.

Step 2: Grate up 1 tsp. crayon. This will be your color.

Step 3: Boil some water in a pan on the stove. When boiling, place the can of wax in the pan. When the wax starts to melt, add the crayon and a couple of drops of fragrance.

Step 4: While the wax is melting, prepare your mold. We used Dixie cups. Place your wick in the bottom. To hold it in place you can put a little warm wax on the bottom of the wick to hold it to your mold, or you can wrap the top part of the wick around a pencil and let the pencil rest on the rim of a cup that you have placed your mold inside of.

Step 4: When the wax mixture has liquified, pour in into your molds about 1/4 – 1/3 full. This is your first layer. We made 4 layers but you can obviously do as many as you want.

Let the wax set up and then repeat steps 1 – 4. Allow to cool for about 2 – 3 hours and then remove mold. Trim your wick and admire your homemade candle!

Sand Candles

For these you will need a box of wet sand. Not sopping wet sand but wet enough you could make a sand castle out of it.

Step 1: Form a mold in the sand using either your hands or cookie cutters. We used both.

Step 2: Repeat steps 1 – 3 for the layered candle. Stick your wick in the sand, and then pour the wax into your sand mold. Unfortunately with these you have to hold the wick in place until your wax sets. Otherwise it will flop over.

When the wax has cooled your candles are done. Just pop them out of the sand.

We had a lot of fun making these and can’t wait to give them as gifts. We hope you try making some too. Enjoy!

Step 2: Pour some tap water in a glass measuring cup and heat in it the microwave for a about 1 minute. Place the cup of lip gloss mixture on top of the water and let it sit till the gloss turns to liquid.

Step 3: Remove from the water and let it sit for 1 hour. Then put it in the fridge for 15 minutes. Now you have homemade lip gloss!

P.S. If were to do this again, I would use cocoa butter or shea butter instead of Vasoline.

Monday, December 20, 2010

This year the girls are in a Celebration Children's Choir. They are loving it! They got to perform their Christmas songs they have been working hard on at 2 nursing homes here in town. They couldn't wait to dress up and sing in front of other people.Perhaps I have some stage performers on my hands!

Today was our first day of Christmas craft week. We haven't had any time this month to do them so we are making up for it this week.Today's craft was Christmas bell made from a egg carton.First we cut out an egg cup from the egg carton, and then we painted it.Next came the glitter.Finally, we threaded a 12 inch piece of yarn into a needle, and then we threaded it through the bell. Then we threaded the jingle bell onto the yarn and then poked the yarn back through the cup.And now you have a beautiful Christmas bell!

Wednesday, December 8, 2010

More Christmas tree math today. This time the girls had to role the dice and add the numbers to decorate their trees. I drew the trees ahead of time and then made a color code for what color or type of ornament to put on the tree for each number 1 – 12. Lori could put bonus ornaments on if her role equaled more than 12. The first person to decorate their tree all the way was the winner.

Lori’s Tree. She had to add a six sided die and a twelve sided die.

Audrey had to add two six sided dice.

Lori loved this activity. Audrey was thoroughly bored. I guess one out of two isn’t bad.

In addition to this activity, I also made Lori a “Lori’s Math Fact Book.” She will be writing or drawing pictures about new math facts or concepts she learns.

Her first entry for today was the addition facts she learned while playing the decorate the Christmas tree game.

Saturday, December 4, 2010

I've been racking my brain for a couple fo years now, trying to come up with something special to do for Advent. The whole advent wreath and candle lighting doesn't really do for me so I chose the Jesse tree instead. I went to the Reformed Church of America webiste (https://www.rca.org/sslpage.aspx?pid=1625) and printed off the ornaments and the readings that go along with them each day. I won't lie. Cutting out all the ornaments was a PAIN. But I won't have to do it again,and the girls LOVE putting the ornaments on.The second thing I decided to do was to put puzzle pieces in our Advent calendar for them to pull out each day as they count down to Christmas. On Christmas day they will get their first clue which will send them on a treasure hunt to find the rest of the puzzle. Lori is very excited about this. Audrey and Natalie could care less.Anyways, that's our Advent fun for the season!

Math is Lori's least favorite subject so I have to get creative when it comes to the math lessons.This week I cut out Christmas trees from green construction paper and put a numbered star at the top. Then I wrote out addition and subtration equations on stickers for Lori to put on the correct trees.I simplified this for Audrey by having her put the correct number of stars on each tree. They both enjoyed the activity and I didn't hear one complaint. Whew!!!